The world COVID-19 pandemic dramatically reshaped virtually each aspect of our lives, together with how and the place we work. Enterprises internationally adopted a work-from-home technique that triggered an enormous surge of IT funding to equip staff with the computer systems, laptops and smartphones they required to be productive.
At some level, as soon as this public well being disaster passes, many staff will return to their places of work. The query then is what is going to occur to extra IT gear: Will it add to an already rising world e-waste downside? More than 53 million metric tons of e-waste was produced in 2019 alone. Or will companies discover different methods to responsibly cope with the IT belongings they now not want?
Fortunately, Blancco Technology Group’s new analysis research, “The Rising Tide of E-Waste,” performed in partnership with Coleman Parkes Research, reveals some optimistic change in how world enterprises are addressing the e-waste disaster.
In this eWEEK Data Points article, Fredrik Forslund, vice-president of enterprise and cloud erasure at Blancco, highlights a very powerful findings from the report. Survey responses from 600 C-level executives and IT resolution makers at world enterprises with 5,000+ staff positioned within the U.S., Japan, Germany, France and the U.Okay have resulted in 4 key issues for enterprises as we head into 2021.
Data Point No. 1: The pandemic has fueled large IT asset funding within the U.S. and elevated enterprise threat.
In line with their European counterparts, 97% of U.S. executives stated that COVID-19 necessitated the short-term funding in expertise, with 77% shopping for new gadgets. When requested what is going to occur to new and used gadgets after they’re now not wanted, the responses had been combined: 27% of U.S. respondents stated laptops could be erased after which resold.
Another 24% stated the gadgets could be erased to be reused internally. An further 7% reported these gadgets could be erased and recycled, and 12% of U.S.-based organizations will ship them to an ITAD for processing. Two-thirds of respondents acknowledge that their organizations are susceptible to a knowledge breach or regulatory compliance failure from the acquisition and potential mismanagement of each new and beforehand owned gadgets, particularly with so lots of these gadgets now positioned in residence places of work throughout the nation.
Data Point No. 2: Nearly half of worldwide organizations have created new roles for executing e-waste insurance policies.
Nearly half (47%) of respondents from world enterprises acknowledged they’ve created new roles to execute e-waste insurance policies, particularly these in finance (51%) and authorized (54%), maybe pushed by the variety of new and used belongings bought as a result of pandemic and the necessity to handle their new expertise stock responsibly.
This new perspective towards asset administration is mirrored within the excessive variety of U.S. survey takers (88%) who stated, “We should take a critical view on making certain all gadgets used to equip the workforce all through the COVID-19 pandemic are appropriately saved and disposed of.” This is an encouraging signal that establishing company social accountability (CSR)…
